PRESIDENT'S WELFARE REFORM PLAN FALLS SHORT OF EXPECTATIONS

"It will be said, and it's true, that this isn't `an end to welfare as we know it.'" -- Excerpt from a Washington Post editorial, published June 13, commenting on President Clinton's welfare reform proposal.

In an attempt to fulfill a key campaign promise, President Bill Clinton has unveiled his welfare reform program. Recall that during the 1992 campaign, Clinton vowed to "end welfare as we know it." Thus did candidate Clinton succeed in sharply distinguishing himself from the succession of failed, liberal nominees his party had offered up to crushing defeats.

We agree with critics that the program the President announced falls far short of the standard set by candidate Clinton in the 1992 campaign. In the first place, all we have is a presidential speech, a Kansas City photo op and a press release. In other words, 17 months after Clinton was inaugurated, no administration legislation has even been drafted, much less introduced in Congress. With such a relaxed approach, we're all entitled to wonder how much of this is serious commitment, and how much is election year posturing.

And what of specifics? At the heart of the Clinton proposal -- and its claim to be a sharp break with the past -- is its proposal that welfare recipients must go off welfare after two years. But what then? The Clinton answer is that recipients born after December 31, 1971, must go to work at either a public or private sector job -- in either case, one that's subsidized by the federal government.

To this, perhaps the most devastating response came from within Mr. Clinton's own party, and from one of its most liberal members at that. Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa responded, "I'll tell you, I'm sorely disappointed in the approach taken by President Clinton. For one who campaigned on change ... this approach sounds like something out of the New Deal ... Government jobs for everyone -- what kind of nonsense is that?"

Sen. Harkin, to his credit, is a co-sponsor with Missouri Sen. Kit Bond of the only bi-partisan welfare reform program in Congress. Sen. Bond correctly points out that by limiting this provision to women born after 1971, Clinton's proposal would target only 5 percent of welfare beneficiaries. "That means the welfare culture will get a free ride," concludes the Missouri senator.

It is an interesting but all-too familiar fact that politicians at both the state and federal levels are well behind the people on welfare reform. The people are ready for much more farreaching reforms than President Clinton has proposed. At a time when sweeping boldness is called for, including root-and-branch replacement of the welfare state, we get a plan that tinkers around the edges of the same, failed system. We urge a bolder approach than the administration has outlined, perhaps beginning with the Harkin-Bond bill.